4J Studios was forced to develop a new online storage mechanic due to big file sizes

Aug 29, 2014 09:00 GMT  ·  By

Minecraft console developer 4J Studios has confirmed that the special feature that allows worlds created in Minecraft for Xbox 360 to be transferred to Minecraft for Xbox One uses a special cloud system that's separate from the Xbox Live one, due to the big files being handled.

Minecraft is one of the most popular games out there, sparking tens of millions of fans from around the world to flex their creative muscles and let their imagination roam free in the game's procedurally generated open worlds.

The game first appeared on PC from Mojang, but soon it reached other platforms, including mobile ones as well as consoles like PS3 or Xbox 360, with the help of developer 4J Studios.

The team is currently working on bringing the title to new devices like PS4, Xbox One, or PS Vita, and it's nearing completing on most of those projects.

While talking with TotalXbox, 4J's Owen Hill and Daniel Kaplan confirmed that the special world transfer system devised to allow Xbox 360 owners to export their worlds into the Xbox One version, required a lot of work and even a separate cloud system.

"The save gets copied to a cloud, but a separate cloud to the one we're used to when we put our saves on Xbox," Hill said. "It's just for Minecraft, basically. You go into the game, you choose, upload your save file to be transferred later by the Xbox One. Then when you upload, you go Xbox One, it pops up, and you say ,'OK, download this one,'" Kaplan added.

The reason for developing a new cloud system was that the save game files and the worlds stored inside them lead to large size that can't be stored inside the regular Xbox Live cloud storage system.

"So it doesn't really use the Xbox profile link thing. Usually when you save a game you say, 'Sure, save my game file to the cloud'. The profiles are not made for the kind of huge save profiles that Minecraft's got. That's why you need to go into the game and select the specific world you want to transfer. It's a different process than usually," Kaplan continued.

However, it won't require any Xbox Live Gold membership to use this feature, so fans shouldn't worry about getting such a subscription just so that they can take their worlds with them over to the Xbox One.

Minecraft for Xbox One, unfortunately, still doesn't have a concrete release date.